Team Lead

Zheng Cai

Associate Professor (tenured)
Principle Investigator of MUST
Vice Chair of Department of Astronomy
Tsinghua University

Prof. Zheng Cai is an observational cosmologist with broad interests in high-redshift galaxy, Lyman alpha nebula, galaxy ecosystem, and QSOs (especially dust obscured QSOs). He has built a sample of most massive protoclusters in the early Universe through Hydrogen absorption. From overdense environment, he and collaborators have identified the sample of the most luminous enormous Lyman alpha nebulae (ELANe). Further, they have studied gas properties through both diffuse emission and absorption, revealing gas - galaxy interactions and the cosmic web at z=2—4. Recently, with JWST, ALMA, and Keck/KCWI, Zheng Cai's team has quantified the heavy element of the gas around galaxies, finding theortical simulations could underestimate the metallicity of the circumgalactic gas. These discoveries could revolutionize the field of high-redshift galactic ecosystems and galaxy formation. He is the principle investigator and project manager of MUST.